Archive for the 'Deadmau5' Tag Under 'Soundcheck' Category

Electronic music, at least in Los Angeles, has never been more mainstream than it is right now: this summer's controversial Electric Daisy Carnival drew more attendees per day than Coachella; longtime fest favorite Deadmau5 will be the house DJ at the MTV Video Music Awards on Sept. 12.

It's also never been a trickier live proposition: since you can't generally see what the performers are actually doing, a great untz-untz-untz show is still all about the spectacle, the way the backdrop, the lights and the overall vibe rise and fall with the build-'em-up-and-let-'em-go tension of the music.

Anyone who saw Daft Punk's ridiculously incredible tour a few years back will attest -- even if the artist in question is just hitting "play" and reveling in an obsessively adoring crowd, the right stage show can still turn an electronic concert into a near-religious experience.

Surely most of the audience at Sunday night's Chemical Brothers show at the Hollywood Bowl, the latest installment in KCRW's always outstanding World Festival series, will agree: the longtime duo literally pulled out every non-pyro gimmick in the book for an outdoor show that was as exceptionally fun to watch as it was dance-club fun to sweat to.

Surrealist landscapes on a monster screen covering the back of the Bowl -- and back-lighting the twosome behind their equipment; the audience never got to see their faces -- segued from soundwave approximations of every beat and a colliding series of balls to tours through famous architecture with tasteful, occasional lasers coloring not only the night sky but the trees at the Bowl's back, where the audience danced most fervently.

Last October, after six years away, Cypress Hill's Smokeout returned in a massive way, expanding to two days and presenting two distinctive lineups, one heavy on hip-hop, the other filled with hard rock. This year, the event is downsizing to one day again, Oct. 16 at the National Orange Show Events Center in San Bernardino -- yet that one day looks to be packed with a deeper bill than either half of last year's bash.

Incubus (pictured) will headline, in an exclusive U.S. festival performance as the band prepares for a new album (its first in five years) in 2011. High-spirited French/Spanish genre-buster Manu Chao and electronic- music spectacle-maker Deadmau5 (here to be "Unhooked") also will perform, along with psychedelic indie-pop group MGMT, Slightly Stoopid, those Distant RelativesNas & Damian "Jr. Gong" Marley, Atmosphere, Vernon Reid and long-running outfit Living Colour, the rap collective Living Legends, Iration and more to be announced.

Naturally, the event's namesake will be on hand as well, this time performing 1991's Cypress Hill in its entirety. (Last year, they tackled 1993's Black Sunday.) Tickets, ranging from $86 on the general-admission end to $431 on the VIP side, go on sale Saturday, Aug. 14, at 10 a.m., though a pre-sale begins Thursday at 10 a.m. at Ticketfly.com (password: LEGALIZE), ending Friday at 12 a.m.

Elsewhere ... Even though Gogol Bordellojust played the Mayan in June, look for the multi-culti Gypsy-punk group's We Comin' Rougher North American Tour to return to Southern California for an Oct. 13 show at Nokia Theatre. Stay tuned for on-sale info ... and in the meantime, check out a live stream this Thursday (via iClips) from the band's set at Red Rocks Amphitheatre, along with a performance from that night's headliner, Primus.

Idiosyncratic singer-songwriter-composer Sufjan Stevens, who hasn't put out a proper album in five years (unless last October's specially-commissioned project The BQE Album or 2006's five-volume Songs for Christmas count), will return for his first SoCal show in a while, Oct. 23 at the Wiltern. My guess is that it will likely go on sale this weekend, but check back for exact details.

New contributor Charlie Amter braved two very long days and late nights of nonstop electronic music to file this report from arguably the biggest bash of the season ...

Southern California may be known for its frequent earthquakes, but increasingly it's becoming known worldwide for a different kind of rumbling: bass-heavy beats and hard-dancing fans pounding the pavement with their feet in appreciation of dance music in all its myriad forms. Now in its 14th year, concert promoter Insomniac's Electric Daisy Carnival remains the region's annual summer prom for those purveyors of hard-hitting blips and blissed-out breaks under the night sky -- and this year's event did not disappoint.

More than 185,000 techno, electro, house and trance fans descended upon Los Angeles' Memorial Coliseum and its adjacent festival grounds this past Friday and Saturday. That estimate, according to promoters, makes this the largest explicitly electronic-music festival in North America.

DJs from around the world came to play, with big names such as Deadmau5, Armin Van Buuren and Benny Benassi all performing pulsing sets to tens of thousands of devotees each night across five different stages. Yet, though international stars proved a large draw, it was the American talent that really fired up the teenage and twentysomething throngs.

Lil' Jon (right), in a surprise appearance, served as the Coachella-esque event's unofficial MC, turning up alongside multiple DJs on several different stages throughout the weekend, rallying crowds with exuberant (yet profanity laced) exaltations to “party” if you “love this music.”

• Electric Daisy Carnival -- For fans of DJ-driven dance music, the massive party of summer is already upon us, as this weekend ushers in this annual mecca of electronica, which tends to draw more than 100,000 people to the L.A. Coliseum and adjacent Memorial Exposition Park for two very late nights of constant beats and spectacle. Friday's roster includes Deadmau5, O.C. transplant Kaskade, DJ sets from Moby and Basement Jaxx, live appearances from Infected Mushroom and BT, Swedish House Mafia, Armand Van Helden, Travis (Barker) x A-Trak and Dirty South. Saturday's bill features Armin Van Buuren, Benny Benassi, Above & Beyond, DJ sets from Groove Armada and will.i.am of the Black Eyed Peas, Sasha, Fedde le Grand, Boys Noize, MSTRKRFT, Duck Sauce and Wolfgang Gartner. Each day features dozens more acts across five stages and tents. The grounds are located at 3939 S. Figueroa St., in downtown Los Angeles. General admission tickets are $75 for Friday, $85 for Saturday, $149 for a two-day pass. VIP tickets, including hosted bar, observation deck and reserved entrances and bathrooms, are $150 for Friday, $175 for Saturday, $250 for a two-day pass. Private cabanas are also available from $2,500-$4,900. 800-745-3000. electricdaisycarnival.com, ticketmaster.com

• The Psychedelic Furs / She Wants Revenge -- Richard Butler, he of the unmistakably raspy voice, and the remnants of his great post-punk band have teamed with L.A. outfit She Wants Revenge (who are overdue to put out a third album) for a tour that stops Friday night at the Grove of Anaheim, 2200 E. Katella Ave. Tickets are $25. 714-712-2700. grove-of-anaheim.com, ticketmaster.com

• Goldfrapp / Omara Portuonodo / tUnE-yArDs -- KCRW's just-begun World Festival this summer at the Hollywood Bowl continues this Sunday with another eclectic triple-bill. From London: Goldfrapp, the electro-pop ensemble led by singer-songwriter Alison Goldfrapp, which has ventured more into soft folk recently. From Havana: Orquesta Buena Vista Social Club, featuring the acclaimed vocalist Omara Portuonodo. And from Oakland: tUnE-yArDs, the moniker for much buzzed-about new artist Merrill Garbus. Show time is 7 p.m. Tickets are $12-$131. The Bowl is located at 2301 N. Highland Ave., in Hollywood. 800-745-3000. ticketmaster.com, hollywoodbowl.com, kcrw.com

• Backstreet Boys -- Still touring behind their 2009 disc “This Is Us,” the long-running Orlando quartet continues to draw more and new fans for its shows, like this Saturday's appearance at Gibson Amphitheatre, 100 Universal City Plaza, in Universal City. Tickets are $19.50-$125. Show time is 8:15 p.m. 800-745-3000. livenation.com

If it wasn't for the mass majority that crowded the main stage to check out the overrated New York rapper and his Grammy-winning guest, I never would have been able to claim my front-and-center spot for Fever Ray (pictured above) -- the female half of Swedish electro-pop duo, the Knife - in the Mojave tent.

While Yeasayer's afternoon performance on the same stage didn't require the full intake of the visual elements - their array of mediocre lights that were further dulled by the daytime glare - Fever Ray's 70-minute set drew its strength from the visual landscape of macabre lighting, terrifying costumes and the intermingling of mesmerizing lasers with the twisting tendrils of sweet-smelling incense smoke.

Unlike some other Coachella debuts where oblivious festivalgoers do nothing beyond staring blankly like sedated cattle, Fever Ray (real name Karin Dreijer Andersson) attracted only the most dedicated fans, who showed their love and recognition of every entrancing track by yelping unabashedly with the drop of each beat.

Those who weren't wise to Andersson's bizarre blend of Bjork-meets-Beth-Gibbons electro-symphonies were easily singled out as the few still desperately trying to get their freak on.

Leave it to the former Johnny Rotten to damn the fest before he even arrives. "I've not done that one," he admits. "But it's very corporate. Festivals aren't what I was brought up with. They're too structured, too organized, and it's really more about people sitting down in deck chairs."

"Oh, that's not what this is," I countered with a tone suggesting he should know better. This is a Goldenvoice production, after all -- and corporate or not, John Lydon and the L.A. concert promoter go way back, to the scrappy early gigs of his second, longer-lasting and (in my opinion) better band, Public Image Ltd. Surely there's some fond feelings there.

"Yes, well, I doubt that it's the mucky pop we used to call British festivals. It's not like sitting in the rain and the mud and the snow. It's just the organization and the structure of it. I'm always wary of that, of looking a bit too corporate.

"But listen, this is PiL -- we make it our own universe, whether we're playing to 200 people in (bleep-bleep) Iowa or 200,000 … which I have done from time to time, in certain European countries … it's all the same. It's a different approach, but you make it enjoyable, you're there to do the best you can, and share the joy.

“The scheduling is hard for me right now,” Paul Tollett said with a slightly exasperated sigh.

“The scheduling always is,” I replied.

Of course, just from looking over the lineup, every Coachellan knows this time is different. This time it really should be trickier than trigonometry for the main brain behind one of the most influential music festivals worldwide to iron out stiff wrinkles, ones that come from determining how to properly space out several dozen A-list stars and hot newcomers across five stages.

Not to overhype it, but next weekend's 11th Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival, overflowing with must-see stuff throughout all three days at the Empire Polo Field in Indio, very well could be the greatest Tollett and his Goldenvoice team have ever staged. Yet it also has immense potential for disappointing overlaps and conflicts, which could cripple it faster than the sun sinks behind the palm trees and purple mountains that frame this annual April gathering of more than 60,000 passionate music lovers.